The photos in this section are of sleeping quarters. Some of the quarters were multi-bed open arrangements without doors, and some were lock-downs. I found every kind of room style in between these 2 extremes.
Solitary bed in sleeping bay
wow on the wallpaper! one of the most eye-catching features of the rooms at Dammasch was the great variety of wallpaper I found there.
More wallpaper...upon wallpaper.
This image is of a door in a bedroom in the women's ward. The indentations you see in the metal were made by a fist.
I think this is a community sleeping area. When found this room I was amazed by the light on the wall and ceiling. I tried to find the source for it, but ???? I could never tell how the light was entering the room. The shape reminded me of a butterfly or an angel. I ended up calling this "The Angel Room."
I am not going to try to fake anyone out and pretend I would ever know what it feels like to live in an institution. I think, though, that I would not want to live in one. When I saw this window with the tattered curtains I thought, "There it is...that's the way out."
Since Dammasch was closed in 1995, it has been host to vandals, to partying teenagers, to former residents confused about where to go, and to photographers and film makers such as myself. At one time, a group of several vandals broke in to the building to steal things. When the police arrived the group scattered. Some got away, but 3 decided to hide in the building and chose a double lock-down area (a room with a locked door inside a room with a locked door.) on the ground floor, in the ward for the criminally insane. The locks on those doors are set on a spring and when the door slammed behind them, the lock tripped and the kids were locked inside the room. It took the police hours to find them, and hours to break into the room. The occupants were so frightened that one of them had wet himself.
After this incident the people at Costa Pacific agreed to allow navy seals, SERT and police teams to conduct emergency escape and entry procedures at Dammasch. The resultant holes in walls, missing windows and splintered doors caused by explosives as well as bullet shells and target practice sheets are found on every floor.
Costa Pacific Communities is recycling as many of the materials excavated from Dammasch as they can. in January of 2006 people came to remove and recycle the metal grates from the radiators in former residents' rooms. In two rooms I discovered hundred of little notes (diary pages of sorts?) They'd been folded into little fans and inserted between the slats of the metal radiator grates.
A former working at Dammasch contacted me to say that the little fans were made by a resident known as "Reverend Jim." In the center of this trio is one of the heater cubbies in which I found these little accordioned papers. To see bigger pictures of Reverend Jim's fans, click here.